 | This is an explanatory essay about the Wikipedia:Conflict of interest page. This page provides additional information about concepts in the page(s) it supplements. This page is not one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. |
As of 2017 there have been no measurements of conflict of interest editing on Wikipedia. In Wikipedia, "Conflict of interest" (COI) editing refers to all the wiki editing which occurs in the context of a conflict of interest and which is said to have a likelihood of being a disruptive engagement, negatively impacting Wikipedia, and greatly stressing Wikipedia community volunteers who come into contact with this activity. COI is a popular topic of discussion on Wikipedia, and yet the community does not have access to basic data about the scope of the issue. Desirable data estimates would include how often conflict of interest editing happens, what percentage of the time it has positive/neutral/negative outcomes, and how much Wikipedia community labor the conflict of interest management procedures are consuming. Various participants in discussions form opinions in debates and take sides in policy discussions. Through all this, there is wide disagreement on the facts and premises from which any discussion should develop. As an example, some people might say that conflict of interest editing causes several serious problems daily which consume hours of labor to address, whereas others might say that conflict of interest editing rarely causes problems and is almost always a net positive.
This page discusses what data the Wikipedia community has to measure conflict of interest and what quality that data is.